Karen joined IPS in 1996. Her public scholarship and activism at IPS has linked community-led organizations with policymakers at the local, state, and federal levels. The focus of her work is on anti-poverty issues, local democracy and empowerment, and peace. Karen currently coordinates the Economic Hardship Reporting Project with New York Times Best-Selling Author Barbara Ehrenreich. The project focuses on telling the stories of widespread economic hardship in the United States.

Some of Karen’s publications include: Battered By The Storm: How the Safety Net is Failing Americans and How to Fix it; Our Communities are Not for Sale; Paying the Price: the Mounting Costs of War in Iraq; Foreign Policy Goes Local; and she was a contributor for Mandate for Change. Karen blogs for Huffington Post and regularly appears in other media outlets. Karen serves on the boards of The Participatory Budgeting Project and Jobs With Justice Worker Rights Board.